November 5 – October 23, 1917: The Peter and Paul Comes Over

General Polkovnikov and his staff try to open a negotiation with the Garrison Conference. They offered to accept the conditions the conference had declared, that is, the policy that orders from headquarters would not be considered valid unless countersigned by the Soviet. But the conference would have to withdraw the order categorically breaking from the headquarters chain of command. Headquarters signed and delivered an agreement to that effect, but the conference never troubled to answer.

It was busy with other things. The Soviet assigned commissars with plenary powers to each military unit and to strategic points in the city. It applied the tactic of “crowding out” government functions and replacing their people with agents of the Soviet at every opportunity.

But the commandant at the Peter and Paul fortress in the Neva River threatened to arrest the commissar, Corporal Blagonravov, who arrived there. Hearing of this at Smolny, the Bolsheviks wondered what to do. Trotsky, thinking the troops themselves must be sound, offered to negotiate. When he and his delegation got there at about 2:00 p.m., a meeting was in progress. The right-wing orators spoke cautiously; the soldiers listened to Trotsky’s delegation instead.

Thus this strategic point and its garrison came over to the Soviet. Blagonravov set up his office and his communications with Smolny. The arsenal and its 100,000 rifles became available to the Military Committee and the Red Guard.

The Preobrazhentsky Regiment of the garrison came over too, protesting rumors (based on their credulity during the July slanders about Lenin and German money) that they were still with the government. As for government troops from the front, cavalry was being held up on the railways at Pskov; the 17^th Infantry Division simply refused orders to march on Petrograd. Delegates from the front itself appeared at the Petrograd Soviet demanding peace. The soldiers of the Fifth Army replaced the Compromisers on their committee with Bolsheviks.

The Red Guards also made their presence felt. A conference of 100 delegates representing 20,000 armed workers from all over the city, convened the previous day, now adopted a resolution for organizing and deploying their forces. Riflemen were organized into squads, companies, battalions, and divisions, and supported by engineers, bicyclists, telegraphers, machine gunners, and artillerists. Women established hospitals and first aid stations. Patrols and guards protected the factories and strategic points.

On Nevsky Prospect, the American journalist Reed bought a copy of Lenin’s pamphlet, “Will the Bolsheviks Be Able to Hold the State Power?” Then he went to Smolny, where Lazimir, head of the Military Revolutionary Committee, told him the Peter and Paul had come over. And that a regiment the government had sent to the capital stopped at the Gatchina Station, passed a resolution in favor of power to the soviets, and sent a delegation to Lazimir’s committee. The committee returned a message welcoming them as comrades and telling them to remain where they were until further instructions from the committee.

Reed saw the organizers of the insurrection at work: Podvoisky, Antonov, Krylenko, Dybenko….

Meanwhile, Kerensky’s Provisional Government issued a decree proclaiming “in principle” the independence of Finland. Both the bourgeoisie and the proletarians of Finland wanted this – though for different reasons. The grant of independence did not extend to military matters and foreign policy. It did not create much of a ripple in Finland.

November 2 – October 20, 1917: Military Revolutionary Committee at Work

The Military Revolutionary Committee, with Trotsky presiding, begins preparations for defending the Congress of Soviets. Delegates aligned with the Compromisers boycotted the meeting, leaving the Bolsheviks, with their new left Social Revolutionary allies, completely in control. The Social Revolutionary Lazimir continued in charge of operations; Sverdlov assumed a role corresponding to that of chief of the general staff.

The committee assigned commissars to all the units of the garrison. Among their responsibilities was taking control of stores of arms; distributions of weapons were to take place only by consent of the commissars. In this way, the commissar for Peter and Paul fortress prevented a shipment of 10,000 rifles to the Cossacks of the Don, as well as distributions to junkers and other counter-revolutionary organizations in the capital.

The typographical workers came forward to report an increase of Black Hundreds propaganda to the committee. Such reports gave the committee an opportunity to control counter-revolutionary agitation.

The rumors about a Bolshevik insurrection that day proved again to be untrue. Nevertheless the government continued its own preparations, which it still considered adequate. The Petrograd Soviet, in a preparation of its own, announced that on Sunday the 22^nd (November 4, new style), it would conduct a review of its forces. The counter-revolution responded by promising a religious procession on that day.

Also on this day, Kerensky’s Minister of War, Verkhovsky, made the mistake of advocating a separate peace to a committee of the Pre-Parliament. Even people who might have agreed in private that this was advisable attacked him publicly, coupling his policy to that of Trotsky. The Minister had to take an enforced vacation.

Finally, as the nationalities question in Russia extended to the Cossacks, on this day they declared the unity of their armies with the Caucasian mountaineers and the people of the steppes. This proved to be the foundation for the Cossack state formed to oppose the Bolshevik government the following spring.

October 25 – October 12, 1917: Regulations for Insurrection

After Trotsky spins them a little, the regulations drafted by Lazimir and his Military Revolutionary Committee come before the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet for approval. Despite Trotsky’s spin, the Mensheviks clearly perceived how useful the regulations would be to an insurrection. But the powers they gave the Soviet had ample precedent in the powers previously shared with the Provisional Government under the dual power scheme.

Another proposal, for the formation of a Garrison Conference, moved forward at this time. The conference would represent the soldiers of the Petrograd garrison in the way the factory committees represented the workers of the factories. It incidentally also enabled the Bolshevik leadership in the Soviet to better understand the purely military problems facing an insurrection.

Meanwhile, Kerensky sent a long letter to his fellow head of state Lloyd George of Great Britain. He promised that the Provisional Government would continue the war, hoping and begging for the financial credits necessary to do so.

October 24 – October 11, 1917: Zinoviev and Kamenev State Their Views

Evidence that the party was not unanimously behind the resolution of the Bolshevik Central Committee for insurrection is not long to appear. Naturally Zinoviev and Kamenev spoke up first. Other members of the Central Committee who were not at the meeting of the 10^th (October 23, new style) joined in their reservations. Volodarsky also did.

On this day. Zinoviev and Kamenev circulated a lengthy pamphlet calling insurrection an unjustified gamble; the Bolsheviks, relying on their strength in the soviets, ought to work as an opposition party in the Constituent Assembly instead. They argued that the “mood” of the masses did not match that of the July Days, and that Bolshevik strength in the electorate would continue to grow.

But Lenin was not trying to win an election; he was trying to win a revolution. He and the members of the committee who had voted for insurrection did not want to re-establish the dual government in a new parliamentary body, and there carry on the debate until the people lost interest and gave up. On the contrary he thought “[t]he success of the Russian and world revolution depends upon a two or three days’ struggle.” This was his understanding of the mood of the people and the corresponding consequences of delay. And, as to the Russian Revolution at least, Lenin was right.

Meanwhile, the commander of the Northern Front, General Cheremissov, demanded a reinforcement of troops from the Petrograd garrison. In response, the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet named the Military Revolutionary Committee and charged it with deciding questions of this kind. A left Social Revolutionary, Lazimir, headed the committee. His instructions were such that the regulations he was to draft would serve armed insurrection and the defense of the capital equally well.